[SPOILERS] DTG hip, hop, hapaxifies

[DTG]

Core:



North:



South:



West:




Capital:




Future Heroic Epic site (building a belated Settler):




Demos:




Units/infrastructure:



^^^ +1 Granary, LH, Library, Mint this turn.

----

I think I have enough OF to 1-turn Literature and then 1-turn Music, even with my gold reserves running dry. Nobody else has Aesthetics. With any luck, I will be able to go to Civil Service before this, because I'd prefer not to use a GArtist to start my first Golden Age (it's better used as the second or third GP), so the only short-term reason to go to Music is to deny the GArtist to the others.

[Shpoko]

Thank you for the report.

[DTG]

Poor Commodore has been attacked by Bob again. If that doesn't inspire him to enter grudge mode, I don't know what will. Bob has a good stack with Catapults, but Comm is now in Vassalage/Theocracy, has Feudalism, and is Charismatic, so I can't see him folding in the near future.

In my empire, I won the Music Great Artist and also spawned a Great Scientist:







The GScientist was timed to start my first GA, since it's much easier to deliberately generate these than GArtists for the later 2/3/4 person Golden Ages. Here are the pre-GA demos:




I just finished Civil Service, so I plan to enter Organized Religion and Bureaucracy.

Elsewhere, Alhazard built the MoM:



This basically means that I have to snowball sooner via my super-capital and turn my short-term economic advantages into tangible gains. If my empire benefits more from each Golden Age turn than his, and if I am able to chain together multiple GAs to either (a) start conquering sooner, (b) grab the Taj Mahal, or c) both, then his extra GA turns won't matter. But if I am indecisive and delay everything, I will eventually fall behind.

[DTG]

Pre-Golden Age demos:




GA/civic switch demos:




Here's my capital. I had to store all of the OF meant for the Colossus for ~15 turns, waiting for OR and Bureaucracy. I've opted to build the Great Library instead:




My basic tech path, which *should* (I'm estimating, not calculating) take 3-turns after Feudalism:






Commodore can research Guilds, but lacks Aesthetics/Lit/Music/CS, and just lost two cities. AT has CS and Machinery, but no Feudalism; Bob is backwards, but warring successfully with Catapults; Al's techs are visible (Philosophy just bulbed).

A couple of my more interesting, recent builds:







The Statue of Zeus is on the Isle of Contention. There is a not-insignificant chance that Al will get mad with my cultural pressure and try to take the city.

Finally, the most recent demos; I was pulling ahead on Crop Yield, but Al just built the Hanging Gardens to catch-up:

[DTG]

My basic tech path, which *should* (I'm estimating, not calculating) take 3-turns after Feudalism:

I guessed right, although I think I had <3 beakers to spare in the end:




It's the last turn of my GA, and I'm debating the merits of Bureaucracy vs. Vassalage. What I'd lose in the capital:




I'll be down ~52CPT after modifiers (more researching, less saving gold) for 1 turn, and then ~30CPT for 6 turns outside the GA... so 52 + (30*6) = 52 + 180 = ~232C, and some hammers? Looking at it that way, Vassalage is probably the way to go, because I'm sure the extra promotions/quicker healing will save at least 3 Knights, and the hammer exchange would then exceed the loss of commerce.

edit: oh, I might save some gold from the Vassalage free unit bonus too.

[GermanJoey]

Can you post your expenses screen? How are you finding the Toroid maintenance?

[DTG]

Can you post your expenses screen? How are you finding the Toroid maintenance?

The Toroid maintenance is fine. It just exaggerates the usual economic rules of Civ 4, i.e. that you need to hit Currency on the turn that you are generating <6GPT at 0% research (after REXing, obv), and that Courthouses are better buildings than Libraries or Forges. Being Mali is quite helpful too, because if you're going to build Forges anyway, an extra 10% gold from the Mint is an excellent freebie.

[DTG]

Elsewhere, Alhazard built the MoM:



This basically means that I have to snowball sooner via my super-capital and turn my short-term economic advantages into tangible gains. If my empire benefits more from each Golden Age turn than his, and if I am able to chain together multiple GAs to either (a) start conquering sooner, (b) grab the Taj Mahal, or c) both, then his extra GA turns won't matter. But if I am indecisive and delay everything, I will eventually fall behind.

The follow-up:












No low % losses so far (worst odds were @ about 65%, versus a hill Impi) although all of my attackers were red/yellow-lined. I can attack 3 more cities next turn. AT can build Macemen and Crossbows, but not Pikes or Longbows (I think), and a lot of his cities are on flat-land.

The window of opportunity for this war is quite small, since Alhazard just got to Guilds and will doubtless try to attack me while I'm distracted. So I can't drag my heels and leave all my Knights on the wrong side of the map. Engineering + 2-movers will make reinforcing easier, and I had a 5 turn headstart on Knights, so I think it is reasonable to expect a backstab in 3–5 turns.

[DTG]

The war with AT is going very well. The progress so far:

T1: captured 2 cities
T2: nada
T3: captured 3 cities
T4: captured 2 cities

I have not lost any units. The RNG has been a bit kind, but really Macemen and Impi can't stand up to Shock Knights in flatland cities. I've gotten >60% odds for every battle, and many are at 90%+.










I think 2 more cities should fall next turn. After that, I will need to figure out the best way to capture AT's hill capital, where he's started to stack troops.

[DTG]

Update:

T1: captured 2 cities
T2: nada
T3: captured 3 cities
T4: captured 2 cities
T5: captured 4 cities

Pics:







A good turn, although I lost three Knights.

This marks the end of the Silly Season. AT only has two cities left:






Redcloak has 3 defenders, and will fall easily; Roy has a lot. At the moment, I am inclined to think that bum-rushing it with Knights will be better than waiting ~10 turns to bring a bunch of Catapults, because with 13-pop and Bureucracy, AT could just whip/chop/build 7–8 Macemen in that time. But, it will be costly.

Finally, I was going to start a GA, but I generated a GSpy at low odds. So I've decided to use him to check for troops stacking on my eastern border, the idea being that knowledge about Al's stacks is more valuable than entering into Mercantilism/Rep two turns sooner:




("I don't like the Pinkertons")